Genetic and population characteristics of Russian trotting horse breed by DNA microsatellite loci

The aim of the research is to study the genetic characteristics of the modern population of Russian trotting horses using DNA markers. The study revealed rare and also the most characteristic alleles inherent for the representatives of this breed. In the future, if the sufficient data is accumulated, it will be possible to construct genetic profiles of the three factory prize breeds (American, French and Russian trotting breeds) at the present stage. Russian trotting breed is the most common of all factory breeds in Russia. In the current conditions, due to the increased focus on race sports, the selection by performance is becoming increasingly important in improving the Russian trotting breed of horses. Prize performance is a complex quantitative trait caused by the action of the whole genotype. So, in breeding Russian trotters, crossing with the representatives of the American standardbred breed, and in recent years with the French trotter, has acquired a serious scale; the results of the work require careful analysis. Based on the results of 926 Russian trotting breed horses’ DNA testing, the population-genetic analysis was carried out on the following indicators, the frequency of types and alleles of 17 studied DNA microsatellites loci, the level of polymorphism (Ае), the degree of observed (Но) and expected (Не) heterozygosity. The effective number of alleles at each locus and the subpopulation inbreeding coefficient (Fis) were determined. When genotyping Russian trotting breed horses on 17 panel STR-loci 144 alleles were established. The number of alleles in the loci varied from 4 (HTG7) to 14 (ASB17). The average number of effective alleles per locus was 3.79. 67% of horses of the total surveyed livestock appeared to be the carriers of the HTG7 OO genotype. The analysis demonstrated the stability of the genetic structure and a high level of consolidation of the allelofund.